


like looking at a beautiful bruise

by thnderchld



Series: heat and sand [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Bird/Human Hybrids, Gen, M/M, Pre-Relationship, possibly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-22
Updated: 2016-07-22
Packaged: 2018-07-26 00:36:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7553383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thnderchld/pseuds/thnderchld
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A wingless Zuko is caught in his emotions and Jet is caught in his softness. (Winged!AU)</p><p> </p><p>“I’ve seen a hundred kids like you. I know what to do.” Zuko looks at Jet carefully, and the other boy looks like he’s got Zuko all figured out. </p><p>“No,” he says, “You’ve never seen anyone like me.” </p><p>“I haven’t, have I,” Jet muses, his smile softening. Like he’s looking at a beautiful bruise. Zuko can’t remember ever being looked at like that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	like looking at a beautiful bruise

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own Avatar the Last Airbender (I wish I did, then I’d improve things...)
> 
> This was written as a possible preview to an upcoming oneshot, this might be rewritten.

Zuko curls up against the base of the barn stall. Everyone is outside, throwing a bonfire or something, but he can hear the sound of scissors and blades inches from the stall door, and he shudders despite himself. He closes his eyes and sees his wings, once pale brown and dim white, now the colour of rust and mud; blood mixing with the sinew. Inside his memories he can remember the feeling of his voice losing itself against his teeth, crashing itself to pieces.

He remembers the white-hot pain against his back, two holes, the price of being  _human._ He can feel the tears tearing down his cheek, his scarred eye stinging and raw with the effort.  _I thought he had changed. I thought I was going to be his son, now._

In spite of his desires, Zuko presses the balls of his hands into his eyes as he bites down a sob. His ex-wings are hurting again. In his entire life before today, he’s never known another bird. Another  _Icarean._ He remembers sitting with his mother and seeing the birds in the sky above them, small bluejays with large brown eyes; the screech of a peregrine splitting through the air above them. His mother’s slender fingers pressing to the place between his shoulderblades, the place where two growths were already forming.

 The blades stop and Zuko is left with an absence in his head. If he listens hard enough he thinks he can hear laughter outside, of people who have been lost and found but are now  _loved,_ and Zuko can’t even think to pretend he can empathise.

 The barn door squeaks open and Zuko can feel humiliation burning in his throat, apologies swelling on his tongue. He wipes his eyes and hears the sound of Jet’s footsteps on the straw, and he knows it’s deliberate. He’s only been here one night, but he already knows that Jet is as quiet as the night when he wants to be. He is wind, his breath almost non-existent. Sometimes Zuko stares at him because he’s not sure if he’s breathing.

“You weren’t with the others.” He can hear Jet turning over the piece of straw in his mouth. Even so, Zuko can pick up traces of nicotine in the air. He partly expects Jet to sit down but he doesn’t. No, he stands steady and grounded behind Zuko, his breathing steady and controlled. The opposite of how Zuko feels.

 “There are, like, 20 of you, how did you manage to notice the absence of one?” Zuko pulls at a seam on his pant leg. He watches the blue string pull tense in his hold.

 “I see everything that goes on in this place. I know everything. Or at least, I know everything that I need to know.” Zuko glances at him and Jet is staring with something akin to longing, face tipped towards the window. It’s overcast, the azure of a few days ago fully gone.

 “Is it going to be a lightning hazard tonight?” Zuko asks. Jet shrugs and reaches up to push a lock of hair out of his eyes. “Should we be worried?”

 Jet grins, then, a jagged and dangerous thing. “You’ll be safe.”

Zuko glances away just before he feels something being pressed into his palms. Jet is now on one knee, hand slipping out of Zuko’s. Zuko glances at his hand and sees a handful of feathers, long and brown and speckled. No- They’re half feathers.

 “What?” he whispers, and he hears the sound of Jet opening his wings. The primary feathers no longer end in elegant curves, instead interrupted by sharp, painfully jagged edges. He feels blood draining from his face, even as Jet’s grin breaks into something genuine.

 “I don’t fly until you fly,” Jet says, his voice light. But Zuko isn’t sure if he’s even aware of the connotations beneath those words, if he’s aware of how deep this goes.

 “You clipped your wings,” is all Zuko can reply. He feels slightly sick when he looks back to the feathers lying in his hand. They’re beautiful and soft, gentle against his palms; a contrast to all of Jet’s edges. They push inside of Jet, all this sharpness, the edge of his jaw; the snap of his knuckles beneath his soft gold skin. “Why?”

 Jet must know that in his hands he has placed his only possible escape tool. For all he sports guns and swords, they’re only truly effective when he’s in the sky. And Zuko has  _seen_ Jet’s wings, seen him at night with his wings cast against the moon, an ever-present protector. Even though he hadn’t seen Jet’s eyes, he’d still felt it; at once warm and stifling.

 “I thought it must be lonely,” Jet smiles. “I’m nothing without the wind. And knowing who…you are, you probably haven’t flown much, but your wings are still a part of you, even if it takes years to accept it.” His hand hovers near Zuko’s bandages but never touch. “I’ve seen a hundred kids like you. I know what to do.”

 Zuko looks at Jet carefully, and the other boy looks like he’s got Zuko all figured out. “No,” he says, “You’ve never seen anyone like me.”

 “I haven’t, have I,” Jet muses, his smile softening. Like he’s looking at a beautiful bruise. Zuko can’t remember ever being looked at like that.

 Zuko glances away, shuddering suddenly. “Besides, what if I never fly?”

 “You’ll fly.” His voice is terrifying in its certainty. But it’s nothing like Ozai’s certainty, or Azula’s; it’s kind and soft and Zuko thinks that might be a thousand times scarier. “Icarean wings aren’t made of bone. They’re growths. You’ll get them back.”

 With that Jet gets to his feet. “I have to go make sure no one’s broken their neck out there. That’s what happens when you’ve got twelve winged kids… and one who’s  _growing_ wings,” he says, referencing the Duke. Then he smiles a smile that Zuko has only ever seen between friends. Are they friends? “Do you want any food?”

 Zuko beams despite himself, and something flutters in Jet’s gaze, but he doesn’t drop his softness. “Thanks. I would like that.”

 


End file.
